A Stargate Christmas Carol
by Jessa4865
Summary: Exactly what you're thinking, but hopefully amusing and fun and angsty too. Complete!
1. Chapter 1

A Stargate Christmas Carol  
Jessa4865  
Disclaimer: Disclaimer: I don't own them; I'm just taking them out for some fun. I'll put them back when I'm done. Promise. I also don't own Charles Dickens (or I would have made him less boring way back when I had to read him) or A Christmas Carol.  
AN: It's just impossible to resist playing with Jack once the idea popped in my head.  
Spoilers for the very beginning of Season 9, with little to no bearing on reality. Enjoy.

Jack hated Christmas. He wasn't sure when, exactly, it had happened, but it had. Perhaps it was losing his young son. Perhaps it was his divorce from Sara. Perhaps it was how, no matter what happened at the SGC, somehow he always spent Christmas alone in his house wishing for some inter-planetary crisis that would result in him having company or even a vaguely legitimate reason to call his teammates who always seemed to have plans for the holiday despite the fact that none of them had anything to do the rest of the year. Still, even then, he'd found a way to get through the month of December without being miserable or ruining anyone's good time or conspiring to hang mistletoe somewhere in Samantha Carter's lab. And yet, it had managed to happen anyway. He'd become a grumpy old man who actually seriously contemplated saying 'bah humbug' to the Salvation Army bell-ringer.

Instead he bit his tongue and hurried home. He'd managed to avoid the general merry-making in the Springs, but he'd be damned if he could get away from it in Washington. He grumbled and belly-ached and bitched an entire silent monologue all the cold, snowy way from his office - where he'd unnecessarily blasted his secretary for having a Christmas tree on her desk - to his huge, lonely, damn near empty condo - terrorized through the twenty-three story elevator ride by the horrid woman with jingle bell earrings and a blinking necklace.

By the time he'd reached his door, he'd been wished a happy holiday by at least ten people he didn't know. He told two of them that it would be a happy holiday if they disappeared right before his very eyes, but even that didn't make a dent. He slammed his door closed behind him, swearing he wasn't setting foot outside of it until sometime in January when his neighbors would go back to hating each other and keeping to themselves as good little Washingtonians usually did.

He threw his keys on the floor by the door. He kicked off his shoes on his way through the living room. His blazer fell by the bedroom door. He dropped face first on his bed, still half dressed, praying to whatever deity he hadn't offended by his lack of good will toward others that he could sleep until New Years. Now there was a holiday he could celebrate - just him and a fifth and he'd have a great night.

As he drifted off to sleep, the idea of calling Carter occurred to him. She was undoubtedly working - she was usually ignorant that it was even that time of the year - and of anyone, he knew she'd probably appreciate a call the most. But he didn't know how to talk to her anymore. It had seemed for a few weeks there that something was going to change for them finally, but in the end, they'd just kind of drifted apart, exactly the way he'd never imagined they would. The few times he'd spoken to her since he'd left had been stilted and weird and uncomfortable enough that he'd started to think he'd actually gotten past whatever that thing was that he'd been convinced they'd shared. That thought was immediately followed by the tight squeeze in his chest that told him he'd never get past what he felt for her, even if they didn't know what to say to each other anymore.

When sleep finally did claim him, there were tears in his eyes for losing what he'd never had.

The next thing he was aware of was icy cold wind that ripped him from his unpleasant dreams. Shivering, he realized he hadn't gotten under the covers and hoped that would explain why it was so cold he could see his breath in front of his face. Tucking himself up to his chin did little to warm him. His hand darted out to grab the phone, ready to rip someone a new one at two in the morning on Christmas because he was not in the mood for foul ups. He'd paid his damn heat bill, so there ought to have been heat. He stared at the phone for a second, trying to figure out who to call while his brain was slowing down from what he was sure was hypothermia. Then he noticed an eerie glowing fog in the hallway. There was no good reason why heat, or lack thereof, would cause the fog or the glow or the creepy moaning, although he sleepily suspected it had caused the lack of heat. He closed his eyes and swore under his breath.

The creepy moaning smoothed out into words. "Oh, Colonel!"

Jack's eyes popped back open as he swore again, his chipper Christmas cheer rising back to the forefront of his mind. "I'm a general for crying out loud! Get it right!"

"O'Neill?" The moaning was gone, replaced by an oddly hollow, yet entirely familiar voice.

Jack's eyes grew wide as the form of Charlie Kowalsky materialized out of the fog. "Kowalsky?"

He grinned. "General, huh? Never saw that one coming."

The sleepy haze hadn't quite faded, keeping coherent thoughts from forming. The sleepy haze also reminded him that was why it had always been good to have Carter around - because even Carter's sleepy haze was coherent. "Damn, Kowalsky, turn the heat back on."

The younger man only chuckled. "No can do, Jack."

The sound of his given name, which a sadly small number of people ever used, woke Jack. He blinked at the sight before him. "You're dead." His half-irritated, half-questioning statement merited another laugh. "What the hell is this?" Jack sat up, rubbing his palms together and blowing on them in a futile attempt to get warm.

"This-" Kowalsky motioned around the room with what might have been a commanding gesture had he been wearing a robe or chains or anything more impressive than a standard issue SGC t-shirt. "-is a singular opportunity to ameliorate unrelenting blunders of personal selection."

Jack grimaced and tried to keep his eyes from glazing over. If he had to listen to stuff like that, there'd better be a hot blonde in front of him. He shook his head. Nope, still Kowalsky. "Huh?"

Kowalsky folded his arms across his chest and sighed, a sad, disappointed sort of sigh. "I've been working on that for a long time. You're getting a chance to pull your head out of your ass, Jack."

"Oh, ok. Why didn't you just say that?" He shook his head again and remembered who - what - he was talking to. "Oh, that's so the last time I drink alone."

Kowalsky winked, which would have been creepy even had he not been a semi-transparent glowing apparition. "You weren't drinking, Jack."

"Yeah, ok." Jack yawned suddenly. "Can I fix things in the morning?"

"Oh, fine. Take all the fun out of it, why don't you? I go to all this trouble to haunt your ass and you don't even have the decency to be scared."

Jack rolled his eyes. "If you're trying to scare me with big words, you're nine years too late."

"Did you ever read A Christmas Carol, Jack?"

"No. And I don't sing them either."

Kowalsky sighed again, frustration evident. "Ebenezer Scrooge? Tiny Tim? Jacob Marley? Ringing any bells?"

"Bob Marley - I know that one."

"Forget it. Good luck, Jack."

Jack snuggled down in the blankets again. "Sorry, Charlie." He smiled at his own joke as he fell back to sleep, silly enough to think there was any sleep to get.


	2. The Ghost of Christmas Past

_AN: Please let me know if you like it! _

Part Two: The Ghost of Christmas Past

He'd barely closed his eyes when he became aware that his bed was moving. Bouncing, actually. He threw his arm over his eyes and groaned. "I'm getting sea sick!" Much to Jack's dismay, the bouncing stopped. He almost opened his eyes, but then he remembered his dream of Kowalsky and decided it would be better to keep his eyes tightly closed.

Then there was a slight pressure on his chest and a tiny warmth wrapping around his wrist to pull his arm away. A laugh. A young boy's laugh.

Jack squeezed his eyes closed tighter and felt the lump forming in his chest. He told himself it wasn't real. He couldn't look.

"Come on, dad! I know you're awake!"

"NO!" Jack clapped his hands over his ears and screamed, not caring who he woke. "Leave me alone!"

"Please, daddy?"

Jack was a fool to even think about resisting. He let his eyes open slowly, momentarily blinded as the tears poured out. "Charlie?"

"Who'd you think it was?" The boy was straddling his chest, wearing the red and green striped pajamas they'd both tried to convince Sara were for boys far younger than Charlie's eight years. Charlie grinned, revealing the missing tooth he'd lost two days before his last Christmas. "Who else would call you Dad?"

Jack reached out with both hands, tentatively cupping the boy's cheeks, letting out a breath at the warmth he found there. "Oh, Charlie, I miss you so bad."

Charlie pulled back and made a face, already displaying the O'Neill lack of affection gene. "Come on, Dad, let's go!"

Although he'd never been one to get swept up in anyone's excitement, Jack smiled and took his son's outstretched hand. Even he couldn't say no to the sheer exuberance of a kid on Christmas.

He tried to ignore the odd way they drifted rather than walked toward the living room. The father that still existed in him, despite Jack's desperate attempts to bury it deep within his psyche, rose up to try to warn Charlie. "Hey, kid, you know, I wasn't expecting company, so there really aren't any presents. Or decorations. Or cookies." Jack felt more disappointed in himself than Charlie looked when he turned around.

Charlie's poker face dissolved into a grin in seconds. "Dad, there are always presents on Christmas! Santa brings them!"

Jack didn't have the heart to mention that he was a little old for that, so he said nothing. Instead and shrugged and hoped Charlie wouldn't hate him for the living room that held a couch, a TV, and a table to hold up the lamp with the burned out bulb he never got around to replacing.

Charlie's eyes twinkled the slightest bit and at that moment, Jack's ears picked up the softest hint of the Nat King Cole album Sara insisted on playing on Christmas. Jack felt himself start to smile as he followed Charlie once more, rounding a corner that hadn't been there the night before and emerging into a room he hadn't seen in over a decade.

He closed his eyes and savored the feeling - the warmth from the fireplace, the smell of fresh baked cookies, the sound of Charlie's excited cries every time he tore through the paper on another gift. When he opened his eyes again, he saw exactly what he'd expected, although it was a sight he'd only actually witnessed once. Sara was tucked into an old quilt, nestled in the corner of the couch. Charlie was darting about the room, trying to play with everything all at once. He watched his young son, unable to stop himself from feeling content.

It felt like only minutes had gone by, but he'd witnessed hours before him. The fire had died down. Charlie was passed out on a half-assembled model airplane. Sara had worked through half a bottle of wine and was smiling, although Jack didn't miss the tears in her eyes. He watched her slowly reached out to answer the ringing phone, her smile brightening when she greeted him.

"Merry Christmas, Jack."

He heard his own strained, tired voice sounding through the quiet room. "I'm sorry, baby. I couldn't call sooner."

"It's ok. I'm glad you're all right." Sara reached up to wipe at the tears that remained in her eyes. "You are all right, aren't you?"

Jack heard for the first time what a bad liar he was - it was evident in the length of the pause as he determined how much of the truth would suffice. Apparently, none of the truth would work. "Yeah, there was a really long line for the phone."

Jack suddenly recalled that day, where he'd been when he'd made that call. Lying in hospital bed on an aircraft carrier, with a broken collar bone, three broken ribs, a surgically repaired lung, and pretty damn near loopy on pain meds - still a far cry from three of the men he'd started out with that morning who'd wound up in body bags on Christmas day.

Jack saw the trembling of Sara's jaw and heard her silence as she fought back the tears. She cleared her throat and gulped a large portion of her wine. "Charlie loved the plane you got him. He would have thanked you himself, but he fell asleep playing with it."

His voice was choked even as it carried across the bad connection. "I love you, Sara. Tell Charlie I'll be home soon."

Jack sat down on the coffee table in front of his wife and watched her face crumble as she stared at the disconnected phone. "Please come home in one piece, Jack." He reached out with shaking hands, wanting to wipe her tears away.

But a yawning Charlie crawled up onto his mother's lap. "Why are you crying, mom?"

She forced a smile out. "Because I'm very happy. Santa got me just what I wanted."

Charlie looked confused. "But you didn't get any presents."

The forced smile turned into a real one. "Santa kept your daddy safe and he's going to be home real soon." Charlie smiled as he snuggled up against her.

Jack turned away with tears in his eyes, looking at the other Charlie who was waiting patiently in the corner of the room. "I can't watch anymore of this." He'd been so stupid - all those years he'd thought that life had been great when he was married to Sara. Now he knew, he understood - Sara hadn't been sitting at home, happy and smiling while he was away. He hated to think of how she had suffered without him, and then how she'd suffered without Charlie.

"Come on, Dad, I've got more to show you." Charlie held out his hand, smiling softly at his tearful father.

Jack reluctantly took his hand, praying he wouldn't open his eyes and see the dismal next Christmas where he'd downed a bottle of Jack Daniels and Sara had sobbed over a photo album and the five feet between them seemed like unfathomable chasm. He didn't need Charlie to show him the room with no decorations and fireplace with no stockings and the obvious hole in their lives.

"Dad, it's ok to look. I'm still here."

It was at Charlie's soft encouragement that Jack opened his eyes, almost shouting out in joy that he was in a completely different room. He'd never seen it in all his life. But as he looked around, he felt a familiar tingle in his spine. The depressed looking Christmas tree. The stereo playing carols that somehow sounded flat. A young man sprawled in a recliner reading a magazine. A teenage girl curled up on the couch. He found himself looking for the parents, for some indication as to what was going on.

"Sure, fine. I'll tell her." The boy - because upon closer look Jack realized he was probably only in his late teens - dropped the phone Jack hadn't noticed. He turned the page and waited several minutes before he looked up. "That was Dad. He's not going to make it home. He said to order a pizza for dinner if there's anywhere open."

Jack decided he had no idea who he was looking at and turned to see the girl's reaction. Except for the slight tightening of the hold she had on the blanket around her shoulders, she gave no indication that she'd heard anything. He looked back at Charlie, who was waiting patiently for Jack to learn the lesson he was there to teach.

Jack moved closer to the couch, finally noticing that the girl clutched a piece of paper in her hands that she was staring at. As he moved closer, he realized she was sobbing, almost silently. He glared at the boy, who was carelessly flipping pages again, seemingly unaware of what the girl was going through.

"Are you hungry or are you just going to sit there and sniffle all day?"

"Shut up!" The girl's ferocious, angry shout made Jack take a step back, even though he knew he wasn't really even there.

"If you're going to act like that, I'm going to go out." The irritation in the boy's tone made Jack wish he really was there to smack him. "I don't know what the big deal is. What were you expecting? It's not like Dad's ever been here on Christmas."

The girl jumped to her feet, surprising Jack by her lanky height, her face still hidden behind her long, uncombed hair. Instead of the scream he'd heard a moment before, the girl barely forced out a whisper. "Mom was here last Christmas." She tore out of the room then, pounding up the stairs and down the hall until Jack heard a door slam. He could imagine her sprawled across her bed sobbing, waiting for someone to comfort her. Someone who wasn't coming.

He looked down, at the picture the girl had dropped, not needing to see the smiling faces of the girl and her mom to know what Charlie was showing him. He only needed to see those brilliant blue eyes to realize he wasn't the only one who' d ever hurt on Christmas.

He felt like shit as he stared after her, wishing he could follow her and give her that hug she needed. Jack felt a gently tug on his hand as he tried to blink back his tears. He glanced down at Charlie and squeezed his hand. "Don't leave me, Charlie." Charlie only smiled back.

Jack jerked upright in his bed, his hand still tingling from his son's hold. It was dark and cold, though not as cold as when he'd thought he was talking to Kowalsky. He was at home, in his bed, still half-dressed from work. He considered the phone, which lay beside him in the bed from where he'd aborted his attempt to remedy his dreams by calling the landlord.

As he moved it back to the bedside table, he paused for a moment, considering calling Carter again. It was two by his clock, but she was in a different time zone. She was probably still up. Hell, he thought chuckling to himself, she was probably still working. He set the phone down and told himself that it would be ridiculous to appear needy and lonely just because he apparently missed her so badly that he was having nightmares about her life.

He shifted back to a more comfortable spot in the bed and closed his eyes, trying to drum up his dream of Charlie to lull him back to sleep.


	3. The Ghost of Christmas Present

_AN: Thanks for the reviews. Keep them coming! They're keeping me motivated. Hopefully, this will be finished by the end of the week!_

Part Three: The Ghost of Christmas Present

He couldn't say for sure what it was that woke him, and he didn't want to risk opening his eyes to find out, but he was sure something was horribly wrong. He kept his eyes closed as a deep, strangled sound assaulted his ears. It almost sounded like someone had set the wrong speed on the record player. And it also sounded kind of like his name.

Glutton for punishment that he was, Jack peeked. Two milliseconds later, he screamed a terribly loud, high pitched, almost girlish scream. Right before him stood Henry Boyd. Sort of. Well, as best as one could stand while being slowly torn to shreds. Jack actually whimpered, taking in the sight that Carter had actually wanted to see. It would have fascinated her. It scared the bejesus out of him and made him want his mommy. He squeezed his eyes closed again and tried to rationalize it. Surely Hank was long dead. Surely he'd been sucked into that black hole forever ago. It had been years, after all. Even if time was going slower there. Besides, if the guy wasn't dead yet, he couldn't be there haunting him.

Jack dared to open his eyes again. "Knock it off."

Hank sighed and pulled himself together, literally. "Sorry, Jack. The parlor tricks are so much fun. They're a big hit at Halloween."

Jack looked at the man before him, no longer horrified. This man had been a friend. Now it was just sad to see him, a man who'd lost everything in the prime of his life. "You are dead, right?" He didn't want to think his friend was still being slowly shredded.

"Yeah, I'm a goner." He waved a slightly transparent hand in front of his face and shrugged. "Obviously. Took a while, though. That wasn't so much fun. I'm sure there's still parts of me being ripped open, but I'm definitely not feeling it anymore." He cocked his head to the side. "The gravitational field extended in advance of the-"

"Oh for crying out loud! You too?" Jack shook his head unhappily. "Do you have to go to PhD school and learn to talk like Carter before they let you haunt people?"

Hank grinned. "You'll like being dead, Jack. There's an innate understanding of the universe that comes with it."

"You mean like the way Carter feels everyday?" The more he thought about it, the more he liked it. "Cool, so when I'm dead I'll actually be able to have an intelligent conversation with her." Hank only smiled patiently. "So what do you want?"

Hank sat down on the edge of Jack's bed. "Well, gee, a chance to say goodbye to my wife would be nice."

Jack's shoulders sagged. "Look, I'm sorry." He knew nothing would relieve the guilt he felt for recommending his friend for a fatal mission. "You know I would have gone after you."

Hank held up his hand. "Nothing you could do about it. It's water under the bridge." He stood up and inclined his head toward the hallway. "Let's move out. I've got things for you to see."

Jack sighed and slowly moved to follow Hank's lead. "Can't be as bad as watching Sara and Carter spend their Christmases crying, right?"

Hank was conspicuously silent as he led Jack down an unfamiliar hall. Soft music played on the stereo. A brightly decorated tree stood in the corner. The scent of cinnamon filled the air. Another room Jack had never seen. He looked around until his eyes fell on the framed photos on the mantel. Charlie. Sara and Charlie. Sara and some guy. It had to be Sara's new place. He'd heard she was moving a few years earlier after her father's death, but he'd never gone to visit. He'd been off-world when his ex-father-in-law had died and he'd been in the infirmary unconscious on the day of the funeral and after that it just never seemed like it was the right time to pop back into her life. He figured it was probably better that way anyhow. Whenever they saw each other, it only served to remind them of what they'd lost.

He moved closer to the pictures to inspect them, realizing there were actually several pictures of that strange man. He glanced at Hank. "Must be important, huh?"

Hank said nothing, but Jack's suspicions were confirmed when a soft sigh came from the couch behind him. He turned and took in the scene, trying to stay detached from it. Sara was seated on the couch. Her hair had grown out a little since the last time he'd seen her, but it didn't appear that she'd aged a day. Her mouth was hanging open in a sort of happy shock - probably due to the small velvet box being held open before her by the man from the pictures who was perched on bended knee in a way that Jack hadn't ever been free of injury long enough to try.

Jack felt fresh tears prick his eyes as the man slid the ring onto Sara's finger. He turned to Hank. "Well, good for her. I always wanted her to be happy. She deserved better than me."

Again Hank said nothing. Frustrated, Jack turned away, looking back at his ex-wife, who was fervently kissing her new fiancé. He tried to smile, tried to convince himself that he was truly happy that she'd finally moved on. Jack had always thought he'd be betraying the memory of their family if he ever thought about moving on, but he hadn't expected Sara to feel the same way. He felt a sob building in the back of his throat as he turned away, unexpectedly crushed by the fact that Sara had really gotten past him.

He turned back to Hank. "Yeah, so, this was fun. Thanks." He surreptitiously tried to wipe at his tears, although why he was embarrassed to be crying in front of a ghost he was dreaming up left him at a loss. "So, back to bed. It's a wonder I don't do this sort of thing more often."

Jack didn't wait for Hank to lead him; he headed for the hallway, firmly intending to come to his bedroom. Hank snagged his arm to stop him. "Not so fast, buddy. I'm afraid there's more."

Jack stood before his friend a broken, hurt man. "I've had about as much Christmas as I can take in one night. Can't it wait until next year?"

Hank shrugged. "But then it wouldn't be Christmas present, would it?"

"Can I exchange it for something else? This sucks."

Hank smiled patiently, unsure of whether Jack had missed the point on purpose. "Ready to go?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"What do you think?"

Jack growled something about shrinks and counseling under his breath, imagining that it couldn't possibly be good that his own delusion was trying to psychoanalyze him. "Where to next? Hey, I've got an idea, let's find some poor kids who are starving to death or maybe some woman who's being beaten by her husband. That would be lots of fun. Or maybe-"

Jack's tirade came to a halt when he noticed he was standing in the hallway of the SGC. The vise returned to his chest, cutting off air. He didn't even think of her before the pain kicked in. "Oh, Hank, come on. Please no. Don't do this to me."

"Merry Christmas, Sam. I'll see you next week." Daniel's voice came from the doorway to Carter's lab. Jack watched as his friend offered one last wave before he headed toward the elevator, humming a jaunty tune.

"You too. Drive safe!" Carter leaned through the doorway, smiling brightly as she watched Daniel disappear down the corridor.

"Oh, Sam." Free of his usual inhibitions when he was around her, Jack stepped up close, closer than he ever dared in real life, and smiled at her. It seemed like forever since he'd talked to her; even longer since he'd seen her. "God, you're beautiful."

He watched her smile fade into a frown as she turned back to her work. She closed the door forcefully before she dropped heavily into her seat. This was a Carter Jack had never witnessed and he watched, curious, as Carter listlessly shifted some papers around on her desk. Usually, even when she was exhausted or sick, she did everything so energetically that it made everyone around her think she was battery powered.

"Is she sick?" He glanced at Hank for a moment, not wanting to take his eyes of Carter for long. "What's wrong with her?"

Her shuffling of papers, which seemed to have no real purpose to Jack, paused. Her attention was drawn to a piece of newspaper and she lifted it up to get a better look at it. Jack glanced at it over her shoulder. He recognized it immediately. It was an article he'd read several months earlier - something about a new comet - that he'd sent along with some papers for Daniel. The sticky note he'd put on it was still attached; his sloppy scrawl asking Daniel to pass it along to Carter. He watched as she ran her fingers over the words he'd jotted down hastily. He thought better of it now, once he saw the way she stared at his writing, wishing he'd taken a moment to actually address the note to her. It probably would have meant a lot to her.

She turned quickly then, flicking her mouse to switch off her screensaver, and opening up an email. He watched as she typed in his address before she stopped again; her sudden burst of energy already spent. He walked around to get a better look at her, ignoring the computer screen she was staring blankly at.

He watched as she shook her head, annoyance flickering across her face. "Yeah, right." She sighed and turned off her monitor. "Hey, Jack, how are you? Remember me? You seem to have forgotten about me entirely. Hope you're well. Merry Christmas. Oh, by the way, I miss you so much it hurts." She folded her arms over the piles on her desk and dropped her face forward, sobbing to herself.

Jack turned back to Hank in shock. "This can't be right, Hank. You're making this up, right? Showing me what I want to see?"

Hank angled his head toward Carter. "This is what you want to see?"

Turning back, Jack realized time had gone by. He had no particular reason for it, but he was sure it had been hours. Carter was no longer seated at her desk. She was on the floor, leaning against the wall, her face gazing longingly at a framed photograph in her hands. It was an old photo, the old SG-1, far enough back in their history that no one had thought it inappropriate how Jack's arm rested around Carter's shoulders. Her head was tilted towards his chest, a wide smile on her face. Carter's finger carefully traced over them before she turned her face heavenward, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Oh, mom, I miss him so bad." Her voice was only a sad whisper.

A knock at the door a moment later just about made Jack jump out of his skin. General Landry's voice could be heard through the thick metal. "I'm sure you're working on something important, Colonel, I just wanted to say good night."

Carter's cheerful voice belied the tears still wet on her face. "Merry Christmas, General!"

"Don't work too hard. O'Neill will have my ass if you get hurt."

She waited a beat before she returned to her study of the picture. "Doubt it."

Jack faced Hank once again. "Stop this. This isn't right. She's not like this. She's not insecure and weak and frail. She tough and strong and independent as all hell. This isn't real!"

Hank shrugged. "Looks real to me."

He advanced on his friend in anger. "There's no way that brilliant woman is curled up on her floor crying over me. Not a chance in hell. You make this stop right now!"

"I'll bet General Landry would say the same thing about her at this moment."

It felt like an ice cold fist grabbed hold of his insides then and squeezed. How many times had she fooled him? How many times had he been on the other side of that door? How many times had he believed she was fine when she was really anything but? His chest hurt. He didn't know for sure, but he was pretty sure that was what a heart attack felt like - searing, hot pain that shot out in every direction from his heart.

"Hank, let me go. I have to get out of here. I can't see her like this. I have to call her."

A sorrowful look crossed over Hank's face, much like the one that would be forever frozen in Jack's memory - Hank's face as he stared at the black hole he knew would be the death of him. "I would, buddy, but it's not my call."

"What?" Jack looked back at Carter, who had finally risen from the floor and was slowly packing her bags up for the night. "Hank, come on, I learned my lesson. I swear. Just get me home so I can call her before she leaves." He glanced at her again, his heart skipping a beat at the dejected look in her eyes. "I'm scared of what's going to happen to her, Hank. She so upset. She's hurting and I can make it better. Please."

And just like that, he was back in his bedroom. His heart was pounding in his chest; the covers knotted around his feet. For the slightest millisecond, his rational mind told him that it was only a nightmare, that Carter would not be happy to get a call from him at that hour. But he'd never paid his rational side much attention and he wasn't about to start. He reached for the phone on the bedside table. It was maybe a foot away, but it seemed impossibly far.

The air in the room changed suddenly, turning so terribly cold that it hurt to breathe it in. He saw the way his arm trembled before he even felt it as he turned toward the utterly dark hallway and the presence he knew was there.

"Oh, God, no." He looked into the darkness, true fear finally taking hold of him.


	4. The Ghost of Christmas Future

_AN: You guys have no idea how much I love the reviews. Thanks for taking a few minutes in this busy season to tell me you like it. Keep 'em coming! It makes me type faster!_

Part Four: The Ghost of Christmas Future

"You're not real." He hated the way his voice sounded - unsure and scared. "You're not here." He wasn't sure if it was a good sign that Anubis had no response. It had to be a good thing that he was dead and haunting Jack, because that meant he was in no shape to attack Earth again. Not that Jack was exactly in the mood to be haunted by Anubis. Not that Jack was ever exactly in the mood to be haunted by Anubis. Not that Jack was ever exactly in the mood to be anythinged by Anubis.

The silent robed figure only raised his arm and pointed. Jack made no moves to get up. "No, really, if it's all the same to you, I'm just going to stay in, you know? I haven't really gotten a lot of sleep tonight."

Anubis hovered closer, reaching toward Jack with hands covered in sores and puss and blisters.

Jack leapt out of bed, yanking his blankets out of Anubis' reach. "Fine, fine. I'll go. But for the love of God, please don't touch anything! Cause then I'll have to burn it to get rid of yucky Anubis cooties."

Anubis turned and silently led Jack down the hall. Jack followed at a distance, not convinced he couldn't catch whatever disgusting thing it was that Anubis was suffering from. Anubis stopped short when the hallway disappeared into an unfamiliar room.

There was something distinctive about the non-distinct gray paint and white speckled tile floor. He was in a hospital of some sort. He'd seen enough of them to know. He took a few steps down the hall, confirming his idea when he caught sight of a group of men and women in scrubs, pouring plastic cups of what appeared to be fruit punch. Another couple of women were doling pills into little white cups that were placed on a cart next to the fruit punch.

Jack turned back to Anubis. "What the hell is this?" He didn't expect an answer; he wasn't disappointed.

He followed the group of staff as they pushed the cart towards a large, drab room. People were spread throughout the room, watching TV, talking to one another, talking to themselves. Jack looked back at Anubis. "This is a psych hospital, isn't it?" The cloaked face revealed nothing.

"Hey there, sweetie!" A heavy-set older nurse caught Jack's attention as she took a cup of juice and some pills and made her way to the far side of the room. "Here you go, darling." She offered the two containers to someone who was entirely hidden by the armchair they were sitting in.

Jack checked with Anubis, expecting some sort of indication as to what he was meant to do. He received nothing, so he approached the chair slowly. There was a woman there, her feet resting on the seat, her knees tucked under her chin, her arms wrapped tightly around her calves. She was shaking her dull blonde head slowly, giving Jack the impression that it took more energy than she had to respond to the nurse.

The nurse leaned down, placing the two cups on the window sill, and looked the woman in the eye. "I know you're very upset, but you need to take your medicine." The woman defiantly tucked her chin away in response. The nurse tried again. "If you don't take your pills, you won't be able to have any visitors today."

The woman looked up then, her skin a dull gray, making her blue eyes stand out even more than normal. "Jack's coming?"

"Sam?" Jack's voice came in unison with another and Jack quickly turned to see another familiar face, with considerably more gray hair. "Daniel?" Come to think of it, Daniel had never had any gray hair, so it was a little disturbing. Though not nearly as disturbing as seeing Carter helpless and weak as a kitten.

Daniel smiled gently at the nurse. "Sam, honey, you know Jack's not coming today."

Carter slowly tore her eyes away from the nurse to face Daniel. "Jack never comes to visit." Her voice sounded so hurt, so broken, that Jack wouldn't have recognized it if he hadn't been looking right at her. "If Jack knew where I was, he would take me home." She ignored the nurse who had picked up the pills and offered them again. "Does Jack know where I am, Daniel?"

Daniel crouched down beside her, taking her hands in his. But his gaze fell on the nurse. "How long has she been like this?"

The nurse shrugged. "A lot of them get worse during the holidays."

Daniel smiled sadly at Carter. "Sam, honey, you know why Jack doesn't come to see you."

"Because he doesn't know where I am. He'd come if he knew. I know he would. He wouldn't leave me. Will you tell him, Daniel?"

"Sam, why don't you take your medicine? Then we can talk about Jack."

Carter thrust her hand out, purposely knocking the pills and juice from the nurse's hand. "I don't want my medicine! I want Jack!" She curled even further into herself, sobbing.

Daniel mouthed 'sorry' at the nurse who was futilely flicking at the wet spot on her uniform. He reached for Carter's hands again, cradling them in his own as he gently rubbed his thumbs over her skin. "Sam, look at me." Carter eventually did as she was told. "Tell me why Jack doesn't come to visit."

Carter looked down, obviously ashamed.

Jack stepped forward, reaching for Daniel, forgetting momentarily that he wasn't really there. "What have you done to her? If I knew about this, I'd be here with her!" His hands passed through Daniel uselessly.

"Come on, Sam, stick with me. Why isn't Jack here?"

Unperturbed by his last fruitless attempt, Jack swung at Daniel. "Jack is here, damn you!"

Carter's chin trembled as she responded. "I don't know. Where is he?"

Daniel shook his head, nodding at the nurse who had gathered a couple of orderlies to force the medicine on Carter. "Why did you get sick, Sam?"

Carter frowned. "Jack's not here because I'm sick." Jack's heart broke at the tears that formed in her eyes.

Daniel surged forward, wrapping Carter tightly in his arms. "No, no, Sam, no that's not it. It's not your fault."

Carter tensed suddenly, pulling away from Daniel's embrace. She looked over her shoulder, not at the hospital staff who were about to force medication on her, but at an empty corridor. She turned back to Daniel and whispered. "They're listening. And you know it always upsets them when you have flowers on your shirt."

Daniel stood up, smoothing out his striped shirt and stepping back as the orderlies took hold of Carter's arms long enough for the nurse to inject her with something that made her sleep almost instantly.

Before she closed her eyes, she whispered something that made the hairs stand up on the back of Jack's neck. "Jack came back for me."

He ran his fingers lightly against Carter's hair as she slept and pressed a kiss onto her forehead. "It's probably better this way. You guys were meant to be together. He never should have left you behind."

Jack swung again in fury. "I didn't leave her, damn you!" He turned to Anubis, trying to grab hold of the amorphous form. "What the hell are you doing to her? Why does she think I would ever leave her like this?"

Anubis gave no answer and Jack turned back to find they were in another room. It was the same hospital, he could tell from the horrible shade of the walls. He saw Carter, struggling against the restraints that held her in her bed. Even in the dimly lit room, he noticed a change from the woman he'd just seen. The woman before him looked more like the Carter he knew, despite even duller skin and an emaciated figure. Her eyes were brighter and she smiled maniacally.

He watched as her movements stilled for a moment and then suddenly, one of her hands was free. She grinned harder as she reached over to unhook her other hand and her feet. Her bare feet didn't make a sound as she scampered across the room. Jack's eyes widened as she worked the object she kept concealed in her palm against the doorknob.

A moment later and Jack was racing down the hall behind her.

"What are you doing, Carter?" He glanced at Anubis. "Aren't they going to stop her? Don't they have alarms or something?" There was an answering silence from the door as she pushed her way through it and darted out into the snow.

He knew there was nothing he could do to protect her, but he seemed to be the only soul who noticed her. He followed right with her, as they'd run a hundred times. His mind shouted at him all things he should be worried about - her bare feet getting frostbitten, her freezing to death in only thin scrubs, her recent escape from a mental hospital, the condition that had landed her restrained and out of touch with reality in the mental hospital in the first place.

And then he realized where they were. A graveyard. A cold, dark, dismal graveyard - not that he really knew of any other kind - that was half buried under a foot of snow.

A storm was picking up, blanketing everything with a fresh coating of snow, dropping ice on Carter's face as she turned her face to the sky. "I'm here!"

Jack looked at her, breathless at the sight of her bright smile despite the circumstances.

Her smile faltered and she dropped to her knees, leaning forward to brush the snow off the gravestone in front of her. "Where are you, Jack?"

He dropped to his knees beside her, physically hurting when he saw the tears he couldn't wipe away. "I'm right here, Sam. Always."

She looked him in the eye as though she could see him and he felt a chill run through him. She smiled. "Always."

He wasn't prepared for the way she slumped over, coming to rest with a quiet thud against the gravestone. He wasn't prepared for the crimson stain that spread out from her wrists into the snow.

He turned to Anubis, more hatred coursing through his veins than he'd ever felt before. "Why are you showing me this? She would never do this! Never! Why would she ever do something like this?"

The only response he received, which was more than he'd honestly expected, was a pointed finger.

Jack turned to look, trying to block out the image of Carter sprawled in the snow before him. And then he saw it, why she'd lost her grip on sanity, why he never went to visit her, why Daniel had been so patient with her, why she'd chosen that spot to end her life. Her head laid heavily on the hard stone, her arms stretched out as if to hold it - the name carved out in the granite: Jonathan O'Neill.

Jack turned back to Anubis, numb from either the cold or the pain, and shrugged. "At least they spelled it right."

Anubis stepped forward then, his shadow blinding Jack in the darkness.

And then Jack was alone.


	5. Christmas Present, Take Two

_AN: Here you guys go... I hope you enjoy it. It was a real blast to write. As for categories... limits it to two and really, most of my story dance across at least threecategory lines. Really, pretty much everything I've ever written has been angst/humor/romance. Maybe they'll create a category just for me. Please let me know what you think! It means a lot to read your notes._

Part Five: Christmas Present, Take Two

Jack bolted upright in his bed. He looked around, the idea of waking up alone almost a novelty after being harassed by the dearly, or so dearly, departed all night. He took a moment to try to slow his racing heart, staring into the dark hallway for several minutes before he decided that his dreams really were over. And they had to be dreams. Because there were no such things as ghosts and even if there were ghosts they surely had better things to do than bug him personally and certainly even if there were ghosts with nothing better to do than bug him there had to be more pressing social or political issues they would want him to address besides his own personal life and even then, bored, intently focused, Jack O'Neill-centric ghosts with nothing better to do and no sense of social justice most certainly did not also possess time machines because, if for no other reason, aforementioned ghosts would be kept in line by Einstein and Newton and Avogadro and Planck and all those brilliant scientific types who would undoubtedly side with Carter about mucking around with changing history purely for personal gain. But really, it all came back to the fact that there were no such things as ghosts.

Jack smiled as he reached for the phone. Carter would be able to list for him at least a thousand different scientific facts that proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there were no such things as ghosts.

"What's wrong, sir?" The panic was evident in her voice, but even the voice of a panicked Carter warmed his heart at that moment.

"Hey, how'd you know it was me?"

There was a pause and Jack could imagine the boggled expression on her face. She was probably sitting up in her bed with her mouth hanging open, staring at the phone like she wasn't entirely sure what it was for. But then Jack shook his head and reminded himself that he should not get distracted by such thoughts as Carter and bed in combination.

"The caller ID says Jonathan O'Neill and while I'm certain there are more than one of those in the world, I'm not sure many of them would be calling me at this hour."

"Oh, right." He squeezed his eyes closed. He always felt like an idiot around her; forgetting about the existence of caller ID was even dumber than his usual antics. Unfortunately, concentrating on not saying anything stupid for a minute rendered him mute.

"Sir?"

"What?" His voice sounded gruffer than he'd intended.

"It's four in the morning. Was there something you needed or did you just dial the wrong number?" Now Carter sounded angry. Well, Carter didn't really sound angry. Carter never sounded angry. She actually just sounded very, very patient and understanding, which in Jack's experience meant that Carter was very, very angry with a superior officer and couldn't let on for fear of getting in trouble.

"Have I ever called you at four in the morning for no reason?" There was a long pause, during which Jack feared she'd put down the phone and gone to sleep. "Carter?"

"Sorry, sir, I'm just trying to remember the last time you called regardless of the time and I'm drawing a blank."

Ouch. That hurt. Jack winced as he thought about his dream Carter and how not-pissed she'd seemed. "Well, I had a reason to call, but you're obviously in a bad mood, so I'm not going to tell you now."

"Fine, don't. Good night, sir."

"Aren't you even curious?"

"Not really."

"Yes, you are." Jack reasoned that if she wasn't curious, she would have hung up. Although he was pretty sure she wouldn't hang up on him because she wasn't that rude and she might, depending on his mood, get in trouble for it.

"No, I'm really not because you want to tell me something or you wouldn't have called and you're certainly not going to not do something you want to do simply because I don't want you to because my personal opinions have never once stopped you from doing anything you wanted to do."

Damn, she knew him too well. "Breathe, Carter."

"Permission to speak freely, sir?"

He grinned. She never asked such a thing from him. "Of course, Carter, although I reserve the right to hang up if I don't like what you have to say."

"Would you like to hear me tell you to shut up and go back to bed?"

Jack grinned and reveled in how small the distance seemed between them at that moment. "No, not at all, Carter. Unless we were considerably closer than a million miles apart."

"Never mind then." She yawned, making no attempt to hide her tired sigh, in a blatant attempt to make Jack feel guilty for waking her from her precious sleep. "And we're not a million miles apart. It's only about seventeen hundred."

"Only you would know that."

"If I'm so damn annoying, why did you call me?"

"I never said you were annoying. I called because I wanted to talk to you."

"In the middle of the night?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

He grinned harder at her response. "So, Carter how many miles is it from the Springs to Minneapolis?"

"How the hell should I know?"

"What about New York?"

"A couple hundred more from DC."

"What about Chicago?"

"A couple hundred less."

"Than New York?"

"Than DC." Carter groaned and he could hear her actually sit up, which revealed that she'd been lying down while they were talking which damn near distracted him again. "What is this about, sir?"

"I'm just curious as to why you measure distances based on their relation to DC."

"Maybe because I'm talking to someone who lives in DC, sir?"

"Carter, how do you know how far it is between Colorado Springs where you live and DC where I live?"

The silence told him he was on the right track. The silence stretched on and on and on.

"Carter? Still there?" Jack got up, pulled his bag out of the closet and started throwing clothes in it. Carter never admitted defeated. Dead silence was the closest anyone ever got to Carter admitting defeat.

"I'm here." She paused again and then sighed. "I looked it up, ok? Are you happy now? Can I go back to sleep?"

"Good, very, and yes. But one more thing before I let you go - don't go to work today."

"Why not? Half the staff will be out. I'll actually be able to get something done without being interrupted, you know, unless the world is in grave danger of being obliterated, overrun, or invaded, although really how often is that?"

"Because it's Christmas, Carter, and it's depressing and I said not to."

She didn't hesitate. "Ok, if you insist."

"Carter, if I call the SGC and they tell me you're there, I will be very upset. And don't think for one second I won't call."

"Are you serious?" The tone of her voice sounded exactly like a petulant teenager. He remembered the image of her from that Christmas in his dream and he decided that was exactly right.

"For once, yes, completely."

More silence. "Fine. I'll sit here and bake cookies by myself cause that's somehow less depressing."

"Good girl. I like the kind with the red and green sprinkles on top."

"What?"

"Night, Carter." He disconnected the phone before she had the chance to say anything else. He was quite scared that, given the chance, she'd say something that would dissuade him from the brilliant, albeit not well thought out, plan he'd hatched to go visit her. He hastily zipped up his bag and was heading out the door when he realized he should probably either put himself back in his uniform from the day before or change clothes entirely, because he doubted anyone, including Carter, would appreciated him half-dressed in clothes he'd worked all day in and then slept all night in.

Being a general was not without its perks. By six, he was on a flight to Colorado Springs. By nine, he was in her driveway.

His nerves caught up with him then, having had a few hours to rethink his decision. He'd had a damn dream, nightmare, hallucination, what have you. Maybe brought on by latent loneliness. Maybe because of the requisite holiday melancholy that befalls any middle aged man who finds himself alone during the season.

So he could even rationalize calling her, if he ignored the obvious desperation involved that would allow him to call an ex-coworker he hadn't spoken to in months in the middle of the night on Christmas, on the grounds that she too was alone and didn't have much family to speak of.

It was the fact that he was there, on her property, after a mad dash across the country, seventeen hundred miles of it at least if he deferred to Carter's assessment, first thing in the morning on a holiday that really and truly drove home the point that one should not chase their dreams. Definitely not if their dreams were particularly odd and involved dead people visiting him who wanted him to not be lonely anymore.

He picked up his phone and dialed her number, figuring she was still asleep, if she'd taken his advice about staying home, and deciding he'd base his next move on her. If she seemed as playful as she had earlier, despite the inconvenient hour of the call, he'd get out of the car. If she wasn't in a good mood, he'd drive away, fly back home and pretend he'd never taken the flight of fancy.

She answered on the first ring. "Carter."

"What happened to your caller ID?"

She said nothing for a minute and he knew she was checking the display. "Your cell is restricted. It could have been anyone with a blocked number, including the base or half a billion telemarketers who have the audacity to call on Christmas morning."

Damn she was good. She always had an answer for everything. "What're you doing up?"

"You're not going to believe this, but some guy called me at four this morning and woke me up and wanted me to make him cookies although I don't know how fresh the cookies are going to be since I'm going to have to mail them two thousand miles to get them to him."

"Isn't it more like seventeen hundred?"

She giggled. He had his answer.

"So you're actually making me cookies, Carter?"

Silence. "I'm making cookies, most likely because I had nothing better to do when you woke me up, but not for you, per se, since they smell really good and I might just have to eat them all myself."

He got out of the car, smiling happily. "That would just be mean to make me cookies and then eat them all yourself."

"Hold on. I think someone's outside."

"Why would you think that?"

"Because I just heard a car door-" He grinned over the roof of the car as the curtains moved in her front window. She didn't have time to hide the smile that lit up her face; he was mostly impressed that she didn't even try.

She came bounding out the front door a minute later, hugging him fiercely before either of them had a chance to think better of the decidedly intimate action. "Why didn't you tell me you were in town?"

He stumbled over his words, not knowing what he was supposed to say and dumbfounded by the blinding smile on her face. "Um- I-"

Her eyes narrowed as she crossed her arms over her chest. "You called me from your place this morning."

He looked down, reminding himself of her ecstatic welcome of a few moments earlier to stave off embarrassment at his grand gesture. He shrugged; she smiled. "I didn't really have anything better to do today."

She looked him in the eye for a long time, searching for an answer to a question she was afraid to ask. After a moment, she reached for his hand and led him toward the door. "I missed you too."

He reached for her then, kissing her tenderly in the hopes of resolving any questions either of them might have had. When he pulled back, his smile mirrored hers. "Someone's been eating my cookies."

She laughed as she walked toward the kitchen. "It's really a good thing you're here cause these never would have made it to the post office."

The counter was a veritable mess, flour and egg shells and bowls littering the counter. A novice chef, she'd managed to dirty every flat surface in the room and some of the vertical ones as well. She had also, however, managed to make some of the most delicious cookies Jack had ever eaten, made especially so by the red and green sprinkles she'd put on top at his request.

They spent the morning snuggled together on the couch, gorging on cookies and watching sappy Christmas movies. At one point, Jack squeezed her hand and grinned.

"So, Carter, explain to me why there are no such things as ghosts."

She turned to face him, her incredulous expression amusing him to no end. He usually ran from her scientific proofs. "You want the long version or the short version?"

He grinned, thinking of the bag he had packed for several days. "The long one. I'm in no hurry." He closed his eyes as her voice lulled him to sleep, content in the fact that any ghosts who chose to wake him would be vanquished in the wake of her systematic disproval of their existence.


End file.
